"Why the fuck did you stop?"
I yelled as panic gripped me. We were definitely surrounded. Men wearing leather armor stepped out of the foliage on both sides of our halted cart.
"I'm sorry, my queen. I didn't have a choice."
He gestured to the front of the cart. In front of the horses that pulled us, there was a cart turned on its side. A man lay sprawled on the ground next to it. I thought he was a corpse until he sprang to his feet and approached us from the front. The short sword tucked into his waistline wasn't visible until he stood up.
None of the men encircling us looked overly impressive. My father could probably slay them all by himself. It was really a shame he wasn't with us at the moment.
"Can you fight, by any chance?"
I already knew what his answer was going to be, but what was the harm in asking, anyway?
"Well, that really depends on what you mean by fight. If you mean can I be easily beaten to a bloody pulp, then yes I can fight."
I shook my head. We were both going to die here. At least his death would be quick. They were probably going to do unspeakable things to me first.
They yanked open the door to my left and a large, muscular man lifted me out of the carriage. I kicked and punched at him, but it was all in vain. He smelled like a mixture of garlic and body odor.
"Put me down, you smelly jackass!"
I punched the side of his meaty neck and he stumbled enough to drop me. The second my feet touched the ground, I brought my right leg up and kneed him in the balls. He dropped to his knees. Tears of pain streamed down his face.
"This stupid bitch got me!"
He screamed out to the other assholes in his pack. I didn't care, though. I aimed another knee at his chin. It was one of the few moves I still remembered from the lessons my father used to make me get when I was younger. As I lifted my knee, something cold, flat and sharp touched my right cheek. I glanced to my right, and all I saw was the blade of a sword. Instantly, I stopped moving and slowly raised my hands.
"Oh, so you're tall, pretty, and smart. We may have struck gold with you."
The man who was lying on the ground stepped in front of me, and between me and the teary-eyed man-muscle. He moved his short sword so that it was now pointed at the center of my throat.
"Get over there," someone said and shoved Simeon next to me.
He stumbled next to me and narrowly avoided slamming into me as he regained his footing.
"Get up, idiot. Only you could get dropped by a girl so easily."
As the man with the sword scolded the smelly one, I could hear the others going through my things in the carriage.
"We don't have anything valuable. We're peasants."
I knew they wouldn't find anything valuable in my belongings. I didn't own any jewels or money. My only real worth was my status as my father's child. Little good that would do me here. The short sword man walked close to me and slowly dragged his blade down over my breasts.
"You're a woman. We can always find something valuable about you."
His sword blade traveled down my abdomen and rested on the waistline of my pants. I was so happy I hadn't dressed up to be taken away forever. He smiled at me and displayed his blackened, rotting teeth.
My breath caught in my throat. This cockknob was only a little taller than Simeon. I could probably take him if he didn't have a sword and four friends. His blade started moving lower again and Simeon spoke up.
"Let her go and take me."
The man laughed and lifted his blade off me. He pointed it at Simeon's chest instead.
"Now why the hell would I do that? We can't even fuck you."
"I could," the smelly one said and glared at Simeon.
I felt myself flinch at his remark. Simeon didn't, though.
"I can join your crew. I'm small, so I can hide very well. I don't eat much, and on top of that, I refuse to be a burden. I would be your best earner."
The man nodded at Simeon's words. I thought he would simply slice him open, but he didn't.
"Okay, I like to think of myself as a fair man. So I'll give you a shot. If you can take out this bumbling idiot you can have his spot."
The man pointed his blade at the wall of protein standing beside him. They backed away a few steps, and I immediately turned to face Simeon.
"What the fuck are you doing?"
I clenched my jaw and spoke as quietly as I could. This fool was going to get himself killed by someone who wasn't me. The scary part was that it might still happen during sex.
"I'm buying you some time. When you see a chance to run, take it."
He was being stupid and brave and it made me wanna hug him and punch his face.
"Why are you doing this?"
"Why not? When you smiled at me in the carriage, I knew no moment in my life would ever be as good. So what's the point of dragging this out? Run when you get a chance. Hopefully, you can lose them in some of this grass and get away."
This smooth talking fucker was actually about to get the shit kicked out of him for me. I was grateful that he would do that for me, but I was also extremely frustrated that I couldn't do anything to help him or myself. I felt helpless and really wanted to do something to help. The best I could do now though, was escape so that Simeon didn't suffer for no reason. Simeon flashed me a soft smile before stepping up to the smelly bandit and taking up a fighting stance. The other bandits stopped looting our carriage and came over to see the beating.
They formed a semi-circle around Simeon and the huge guy and hooted as the two men circled one another. Simeon attacked first. He threw a straight punch into the bigger man's meaty gut. The bandit laughed and backhanded him. The slap sent Simeon stumbling to his left, barely keeping his balance. When he stood back up straight, a trickle of blood ran from his lower lip. The crowd of thieves cheered at the sight of fresh blood. All of them were completely distracted by the spectacle. Even the guy with the sword was too busy cheering them on to keep an eye on me. I took a step toward the road, then another. I didn't want to run away too soon and have his plan fail. I also didn't wanna wait too long and the guy beat him to death. I had to time this exactly right.
"Come on, take my spot."
He punched Simeon in the stomach and then shoved him to the ground. I winced at the pained look on poor Simeon's face. I wanted to run over and throw myself on the ground next to him. Screw it, they could just kill us both. I started to move forward and noticed Simeon was staring at me. He kept looking from me to the road. He was telling me to leave. I took another step backward as he stood back up.
"You hit like a chump."
The bandits let out a loud round of cheers at his cocky remark. I took one last step toward the road and then turned and sprinted down the road.
"Hey, she's getting away!" one of them called from behind me.
Suddenly there were footsteps quickly coming up behind me. I had a head start, but I was never good at running. They would catch up to me, eventually. I just hoped that they would end me quickly when they did. I made the mistake of looking backward to try to see if I could get a glimpse of Simeon. I didn't know if he was okay, or even alive. I really hoped he was. My foot landed on something round and hard and the next thing I knew, I fell face first on the path. I hit my head hard and got dirt in my right eye. I ended up crawling on my hands and knees trying to figure out what the blurry shapes I was seeing were.
The footsteps caught up to me finally.
"Look at her crawling like an animal. We should gut her too."
Oh god they killed Simeon! I stopped moving and hung my head. He was such a sweet guy, and these asshats killed him. What was the point of continuing on? If they didn't use me up and throw me away, this Kato guy definitely would.
"Do it."
I rose up on my knees as my vision began to clear up. The guy with the short sword stood in front of me with a stupid grin on his face.
"Oh no, you don't get off so easily."
He licked his dry cracked lips and bile rose inside of me. His friends began to laugh as they hovered over me. Then something streaked through the air and splattered across my face. It shocked me so badly I barely noticed that every bandit except the one holding the sword had taken off running. He leaned toward me as I wiped the warm liquid off my face. As I studied the palm of my hand and realized it was covered in fresh blood, he fell to the ground beside me. I scrambled backward away from him. I finally remembered what fear felt like when I saw the arrow sticking out of his eye socket. It was only then that I heard the horses approaching.